


Panic

by suchaehwa



Series: Peter Mills-centric [2]
Category: Chicago Fire
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Graphic Description, Hurt/Comfort, I'm gonna make those tags, M/M, My baby Peter, Panic Attacks, Peter Mills centric, Protective Casey, Protective Chief Boden, Protective Severide, Season 1 Episode 8, Team Bonding, Team as Family, not really - Freeform, poor Mills, the dismembered body on the tracks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-25
Updated: 2017-09-25
Packaged: 2019-01-05 11:18:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12188979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suchaehwa/pseuds/suchaehwa
Summary: After finding the dismembered body of the girl on the train tracks Peter isn't doing so well. And then suddenly it hits him all at once when he's in the kitchen making scrambled eggs. He doesn't know what's happening but his team has got him.





	Panic

**Author's Note:**

> Warning for panic attacks!  
> Please be safe people. Don't keep it all to yourself, talk to a friend or your family or even me. And if you don't want to do that then please reach out to someone. There's a link to a great site if you want to talk to someone. Stay safe lovelies.  
> https://www.7cups.com/

There’s nothing odd about the day, so far they’ve only been called in once to a small house fire where a small candle lit a curtain up. But so far no one has been brought to the hospital or even gotten a bruise, so why his chest suddenly feels tight when he’s cooking scrambled eggs is beyond him.

It starts small, almost like he’s downed a glass of a water too quickly and it’s gotten stuck in his chest for a few seconds, except it doesn’t go away. He waits for about a minute for it to disappear but it never does, it almost seems to be growing.

He shakes his head and blows out a breath of air and goes back to scrambling the eggs. He rubs a free hand over his chest to soothe the tingling ache that just doesn’t want to leave him alone. Pouch barks from down by his feet and he almost loses his grip on the handle of the pan, it rattles loudly and he hears Mouch sit up in the worn down couch, “hey candidate! Don’t drop the food, we real men are getting hungry” and Otis’ laughter follows the comment. It’s just like any other day and any other day Peter would have a sassy comeback but for some reason, his throat closes up and he chokes on his words. 

The laughter dies down behind him and he hopes they’ll leave it alone and go back to whatever they were doing before, but then unexpectedly there’s a hand that he’s sure belongs to Cruz right next to him that squirts ketchup all over the eggs and suddenly the eggs look like the brain matter he found on the train tracks and he feels sick to his stomach. His hand loses its grip and the pan crashes down onto the floor with a loud sound that alerts the rest of the firemen in the room.

“Hey, candidate! What did I just tell you?” Mouch yells angrily and Peter presses a hand over his mouth to stop himself from being sick all over the kitchen. He leans against the bench and tries to calm himself down but all his attempts are fruitless and he feels the pressure in his chest get worse with every second that passes. 

He pushes away from the bench and turns around so that he’s facing his team but he’s not looking at them, he can’t look at them. Because he knows that as soon as his eyes lock with Otis he’ll be taunted for being weak and about to cry like a baby and not the grown-up man he is.

He gasps for air and grabs at his shirt like it’ll lessen the pressure in his chest but it doesn’t work and he feels the air escaping him, it’s like he’s in a burning house and running out of oxygen, it only makes him panic even more and he lets out a choked sob. Seconds later there are hands on his shoulders trying to steady him but he can’t concentrate on anything other than how lightheaded he feels and the pain in his chest.

“Mills! What’s going on?” he recognizes the voice as Casey’s and he tries to pull himself together as to not embarrass himself even more in front of his lieutenant. But despite his best attempts his breaths keep coming out short and he feels his knees weaken.

There are voices trying to talk to him, they’re calling his name and asking what’s happening but they all meddle together and it sounds like he’s underwater, he can’t answer their questions, because he physically can’t talk but also because he doesn’t even know what’s going on. One second he’s cooking food and the next he can’t breathe.

He knows he’s shaking, knows his hands are gripping way too tight and that he’s being held up by Casey’s hands on him. He feels so weak in that moment that he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

“Hey Mills, you have to talk to me!” Casey says but Peter can hear it in his voice that it’s an order, so he does his best to answer the man, “I-I can’t b-breathe,” he wheezes and then there’s another set of hands on him and he’s being moved (practically dragged) over to the couch. 

He opens his eyes, he didn’t even notice that he closed them, to see Casey on his knees in front of him and his mouth is moving but there are no sounds. Peter falls forward a bit and grips his lieutenant's shoulders with a strength he didn’t know he had and Casey places his own hands on top of the younger man’s.

But then the man in front of him is removing his hands and he panics and wheezes out “don’t l-leave,” but as soon as the words are out there’s another man in front of him that he recognizes as his Chief and his hands are gripped in the older man’s.

“Peter I need you to look at me,” the man orders and Peter does exactly so, despite being so panicked he still knows how to follow orders, especially from Chief Boden. “C’mon kid,” the Chief adds and Peter’s eyes rise to look into the dark browns in front of him.

“What’s going on son?” he asks and Peter breaks into a sob at the question, “I c-can’t breathe and I d-don’t know w-why I-” there’s someone rubbing comforting circles on his back and at first thought he thinks it must be Gabby but by the size of the hand he knows it must be one of the men.

“Alright, I need you to listen to me. You’re alright, this is a panic attack, but you’re not in danger, you’re at the station and you’re gonna be fine, you hear me kid?” Peter nods furiously and clenches his fists that are still in Chief’s grip.

“How about you breathe with me, five seconds in and five seconds out, can you do that?” the chief doesn’t give him a chance to answer because a second later there’s a hand on his chest rubbing a comforting motion and he hears the chief start counting.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5- her mangled body on the tracks, so bruised and broken that if they didn’t know who they were looking for they wouldn’t have known who she was.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5- her brother’s desperate cries for them to find her, but not in the way they did.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5- Casey’s hand on his shoulder like a friendly pat would change the fact that she was dead, her arm lying a few feet away from him and one of her legs a few feet to his left.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5- Chief Boden’s talk about seeing a counselor, like talking to a paid person on a beige couch will reverse time and stop her from being so...so fucking dead.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5- it could have been Elise, it could have been a friend of his, it could have been one of their mangled bodies on the train tracks.

With the next exhale he chokes out an “I’m sorry” and removes his hands from Chief Boden’s to rest his face in them. His breathing isn’t quite back to normal but he feels a bit better, but most of all embarrassed.

Embarrassed for showing such weakness in front of Lieutenant Casey as well as Lieutenant Severide. But worst of all, in front of Chief Boden. There’s no way he’ll make squad now, there's no way he’ll ever wear the uniform again now that they’ve seen how weak he is and how easily he breaks and…

 

“Hey buddy, it’s all good. You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t have an episode at some point,” Severide points out and Peter hears the slap he receives from Shay.

“How about you go get some rest and if you feel up for it you can ride with us on next call, but don’t feel any pressure, if you feel like shit then sleep it off and we’ll hit work back up tomorrow. Alright?” Casey questions and Peter raises his head to look at his lieutenant in fear of seeing the disappointment he’s been waiting for, but he sees no such thing. The only thing he sees is concern and it warms him to know that they care, after all, he’s just a candidate; but they’re still there for him like he’s one of them.

He pauses for a few seconds to just take a couple of deep breaths and no one pesters him about it, so he sits for a while on the couch, with the guys (and Shay and Gabby) all around him until he feels ready. He nods silently and feels an arm hook around his body and then he’s being pulled up on weak knees, Casey pats him on the chest as Severide joins him on the other side of Peter. “What about the eggs?” Peter mumbles tiredly, worn out and ready to go to sleep but still worried about the others, who’s gonna cook for them?

Severide laughs beside him hits him jokingly on the head, “Otis will take care of it, you just focus on you, alright candidate?” Peter grins and leans heavily against the lieutenants. “Better call in sick right away, then,” he mumbles and hears Otis’ shocked laugh behind him.

“Kid almost had a heart attack and still has the strength to insult me.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed! I plan on writing more about Peter because he's my favorite character and I love angst and comfort.  
> Hope you have a good day :)


End file.
